Peatlands Ireland – The Bogs That Store Billions of Tonnes of Carbon and Why Their Restoration Matters

Peatlands Ireland covers a subject of enormous environmental significance. Peatlands blanket approximately 20% of the island, making Ireland one of the most peat-rich countries in Europe relative to its size. Yet an estimated 80% of these ecosystems are degraded – drained, cut, planted with conifers or otherwise damaged by centuries of human activity. That degradation has turned what should be one of Ireland’s greatest natural assets into a source of greenhouse gas emissions, biodiversity loss and water quality problems. This guide covers the ecology of Irish peatlands, their types, their cultural importance, the scale of damage done and the unprecedented restoration effort now under way to bring them back to life.

Globally, peatlands hold around 30% of all soil carbon on just 3% of the world’s land surface. In Ireland, peatlands store an estimated 1.6 billion tonnes of carbon – and some estimates put it higher. When healthy, they are carbon sinks, slowly accumulating organic matter at roughly one millimetre per year. When degraded through drainage, cutting or afforestation, they become carbon sources, releasing centuries of stored carbon as CO2. Restoring Ireland’s approximately 700,000 hectares of degraded peatland could avoid up to two million tonnes of carbon emissions per year, making peatland restoration one of the most powerful nature-based climate solutions available to the country.

🌿 What Peatlands Are and How They Form

Peatlands are waterlogged ecosystems where dead plant material accumulates as peat instead of fully decomposing. In most environments, dead vegetation is broken down by microorganisms, but in the permanently saturated, acidic, oxygen-poor conditions of a bog, decomposition slows almost to a halt. Over thousands of years, this partially decayed plant material – overwhelmingly sphagnum moss – builds up in layers to form peat. The process is astonishingly slow, typically adding just one millimetre of depth per year. A bog that is five metres deep may have been forming since the end of the last ice age, over 10,000 years ago.

This slow accumulation is what gives peatlands their extraordinary carbon storage capacity. Each millimetre of new peat locks away atmospheric carbon in a form that can remain stable for millennia – as long as the peatland remains wet. The moment a peatland is drained, however, air enters the peat, decomposition resumes and that ancient carbon begins to escape as CO2.

🗺️ Types of Irish Peatland

Ireland has three main types of peatland, each with distinct characteristics and distribution.

Raised bogs are found primarily in the midlands. They are dome-shaped structures, fed entirely by rainfall rather than groundwater, that have grown upward above the surrounding landscape over thousands of years. Raised bogs are characterised by a distinctive surface of sphagnum mosses, bog cotton, ling heather and sundews. Ireland holds a significant proportion of the remaining active raised bog in Western Europe, making their conservation of continental importance.

Blanket bogs are found mainly along the western seaboard and in upland areas, where high rainfall (typically over 1,200mm per year) keeps the ground permanently saturated. They drape across the landscape like a blanket – hence the name – and include both Atlantic blanket bogs at low altitudes in the west and mountain blanket bogs at higher elevations. Blanket bogs support a distinctive community of plants and animals and are a defining feature of the Irish landscape in counties like Galway, Mayo, Donegal and Kerry.

Fens are groundwater-fed peatlands that tend to be alkaline and more nutrient-rich than bogs. They are generally more species-rich and were historically more common across the midlands and lowlands before widespread agricultural drainage. Many Irish fens have been lost or severely degraded.

⛏️ A History of Extraction

The relationship between Irish people and bogs stretches back millennia, but the scale of exploitation has accelerated dramatically over the past century. Turf cutting for domestic fuel was a central feature of rural Irish life for generations. Families held turbary rights – the legal right to cut turf on a particular stretch of bog – and the annual saving of the turf was a communal activity embedded in the culture of every county where bogs were found.

Industrial-scale extraction began with the establishment of the Turf Development Board in 1934, later reconstituted as Bord na Mona in 1946. The semi-state company was created to exploit Ireland’s peatlands for energy production, and at its peak it operated across approximately 80,000 hectares of bogland in the midlands. Mechanised milling harvested peat on an industrial scale to fuel a network of peat-fired power stations, including stations at Shannonbridge, Lanesborough and Edenderry. The last of these power stations has since been decommissioned.

Alongside industrial extraction, large areas of blanket bog and raised bog were drained and planted with Sitka spruce under state-supported afforestation programmes from the 1950s onwards. These dense conifer plantations fundamentally altered the hydrology, ecology and carbon balance of the underlying peatland. The drainage required for forestry lowered water tables, initiated peat oxidation and destroyed the bog habitat.

The cumulative result is that approximately 80% of Irish peatlands are now in a degraded state. Much of this degradation is irreversible on human timescales, but restoration can halt further carbon loss, begin the slow process of recovery and re-establish at least some of the ecological functions that healthy peatlands provide.

📚 Cultural Significance

Irish bogs hold a unique place in the country’s cultural heritage. The acidic, oxygen-free conditions that preserve plant material as peat also preserve archaeological remains with extraordinary fidelity. Ireland’s bogs have yielded remarkable finds including bog bodies – Iron Age human remains preserved in near-perfect condition – bog butter, ancient trackways (toghers) built to cross wetlands, and tools and weapons spanning thousands of years. The National Museum of Ireland houses some of Europe’s most significant bog body finds, including Clonycavan Man and Old Croghan Man.

In literature, the bog has been a powerful presence. Seamus Heaney, the Nobel Prize-winning poet, returned to bogland imagery throughout his career, most famously in the “bog poems” of North (1975), which used the preserved bog bodies as metaphors for violence, memory and the layered history of Ireland. The Irish language is rich with bog vocabulary, reflecting centuries of intimate daily interaction with these landscapes.

🦋 Ecology of Healthy Peatlands

Healthy Irish peatlands support specialised ecological communities that are found in few other habitats. The dominant plants are sphagnum mosses – the keystone organisms of bog formation – along with bog cotton (Eriophorum), ling heather, cross-leaved heath, sundews (insectivorous plants that supplement their nutrition by trapping insects), butterwort and bog rosemary.

For wildlife, peatlands provide critical breeding habitat. Golden plover, a red-listed wading bird, nests almost exclusively on blanket bog in Ireland. The curlew, one of Ireland’s most endangered breeding birds, is closely associated with bogland. Dragonflies and damselflies breed in bog pools, while the Large Heath butterfly – a specialist of peatland habitats – depends on intact bog for its lifecycle. Among mammals, the Irish hare uses blanket bog extensively, and otters are found along bog streams and pools.

🔧 The Restoration Programmes

Bord na Mona – Peatlands Climate Action Scheme

The largest single peatland restoration programme in Ireland is being led by Bord na Mona. Having ceased all commercial peat harvesting, the company is now rehabilitating approximately 33,000 hectares of former industrial peatland across 82 bogs in the midlands under the Peatlands Climate Action Scheme (PCAS), also known as the Enhanced Decommissioning, Rehabilitation and Restoration Scheme (EDRRS). Funded by €108 million from the EU Recovery and Resilience Facility through Ireland’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan, the scheme is regulated by the National Parks and Wildlife Service.

By the end of 2024, rehabilitation had been completed on 18,861 hectares – 57% of the total target – with works continuing on the remaining 14,139 hectares. The scheme is estimated to result in a net reduction of 3.3 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent over the period to 2050 and protects the storage of 100 million tonnes of CO2. It has also created approximately 310 jobs in the midlands, contributing to a Just Transition for communities that previously depended on peat extraction for employment.

The restored bogs will develop into a mosaic of habitats including re-wetted peatland, developing bog, wetland and native woodland. The return of wildlife has already been notable, with species such as the Eurasian crane – which had been absent from Ireland as a breeding bird for centuries – now established on rehabilitated Bord na Mona bogs.

Coillte Nature – Wild Western Peatlands

Coillte, the state forestry company, manages approximately 232,500 hectares of peatland – nearly three times the Bord na Mona estate. Through its Coillte Nature division, the company is undertaking the Wild Western Peatlands Project, which involves removing inappropriate conifer plantations from blanket bogs in the west of Ireland, blocking the associated drainage and allowing the bog to begin recovering its natural hydrology. This work is complementary to the Bord na Mona programme and addresses a different type of peatland damage – afforestation rather than industrial extraction.

NPWS – Protected Raised Bogs

The National Parks and Wildlife Service has been running an accelerated programme of restoration on protected raised bog Special Areas of Conservation (SACs) and Natural Heritage Areas. Since 2018, restoration has been completed on 5,000 hectares of protected raised bogs, funded by €5 million per year from carbon tax revenue plus additional exchequer funding. The EU LIFE “Living Bog” project, which concluded in 2022, completed restoration on 2,650 hectares across 12 sites in seven counties.

PEAT+ Cross-Border Project

Launched in February 2025 on World Wetlands Day, the PEAT+ Project is a major €19.2 million cross-border initiative funded by the EU PEACEPLUS programme. Led by Ulster Wildlife, with partners including Atlantic Technological University Donegal, Mourne Heritage Trust and several local councils, PEAT+ will deliver large-scale peatland restoration across 19 priority sites in Northern Ireland and the border counties of Ireland over three years. The project includes restoration work in Glenveagh National Park and targets threatened species including golden plover and the Large Heath butterfly. It also incorporates research and innovation, including the use of portable soil analysis systems and real-time water monitoring sensors.

📜 Policy and Regulation

The Peatland Standard for Ireland

A significant policy development came on 7 March 2025 with the official launch of the Peatland Standard for Ireland – a pioneering voluntary certification developed by Peatland Finance Ireland, a not-for-profit organisation, in collaboration with academic institutions, government bodies, semi-state agencies and civil society. The standard enables landowners and farmers to demonstrate the environmental benefits of peatland restoration, including carbon reduction, water storage, biodiversity enhancement and improved water quality. By offering verified ecosystem certificates, landowners can attract private and philanthropic investment alongside public funding. The development was supported by Amazon’s Right Now Climate Fund (€495,000) and the European Investment Bank. Pilot projects began in 2025 to test the concept and establish reference sites.

EU Nature Restoration Regulation

Under the EU Nature Restoration Regulation, which Ireland voted in favour of adopting, member states must ensure that 30% of drained peatlands under agriculture have restoration measures in place by 2030, with a quarter of that area rewetted. This is a significant commitment given the extent of peatland drainage associated with Irish agriculture. The regulation creates a legally binding obligation to begin reversing centuries of peatland degradation.

Northern Ireland Peatland Strategy to 2040

In September 2025, the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs in Northern Ireland launched its Peatland Strategy to 2040, providing a framework for the conservation and restoration of peatland habitats in the north. The strategy supports biodiversity conservation, climate action and the wider Green Growth agenda, and complements the cross-border approach being taken through the PEAT+ project.

🏔️ Community and Engagement

The Irish Peatland Conservation Council, based at the Bog of Allen Nature Centre in County Kildare, has been a leading voice for peatland conservation for over three decades. It runs education programmes, manages peatland nature reserves, advocates for policy change and engages communities across the midlands in understanding and protecting their local bogs. The Community Wetlands Forum connects community groups working on wetland conservation across Ireland, fostering knowledge-sharing and peer support.

The transformation of Bord na Mona’s estate has also created new amenity and recreation opportunities. Lough Boora Parklands in County Offaly, developed on former industrial bogland, is now a major visitor attraction featuring sculpture trails, cycling routes and birdwatching hides. It demonstrates how restored peatlands can provide economic value through tourism and recreation as well as environmental services.

⏳ The Scale of the Challenge

Ireland’s peatland restoration effort is now among the most ambitious in Europe, but the scale of the challenge remains immense. With 700,000 hectares of degraded peatland, the current programmes – though substantial – address only a fraction of the total. Public funding alone will not cover the cost of restoring all of Ireland’s bogs, which is why instruments like the Peatland Standard are so important in unlocking private investment.

The science is clear that rewetting degraded peatlands delivers rapid reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, even before the long-term recovery of peat-forming conditions. It also delivers co-benefits for water quality, flood attenuation, wildlife habitat and community wellbeing. The challenge is political, financial and logistical – scaling proven techniques across hundreds of thousands of hectares while navigating competing land use pressures, property rights and the cultural attachment that many rural communities still have to turf cutting and traditional bog access.

What is already clear from the Bord na Mona programme is that peatlands can recover faster than many expected. The return of cranes, the re-establishment of sphagnum, the stabilisation of water tables and the reduction in carbon emissions from rehabilitated bogs all point to a landscape that is responding to restoration. The question is whether Ireland can match its ambition to the pace the climate and biodiversity crises demand.